Tag Archives: renewable energy

The Energy Transition is a crazy pitching evolving business need.

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The Energy Transition is probably the most challenging undertaking we need to take in a short time frame of thirty years. to give our planet the chance to regain balance for us to live in and protect what we have.

To get there, we will need to chase a crazy pursuit of existing, competing businesses, all vested in how we do things, to gain their attention and convince them of a sense of urgency and need for a rapid change from the existing to a preferred, based more on renewables, as our principle source of energy.

Equally, I need to undertake a more focused approach. I have recently revamped my thinking towards the Energy Transition. Click on the tabs within this posting and website to understand the changes that need to be undertaken centred on innovation as central to this.

Different companies have different understandings of the changing energy ecosystem; some are narrow in their views and very focused on their business, others seek to break out and become more recognized, while others still want to be seen as leading. What and how do you pitch to each?

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First Global Stocktake for the forthcoming CoP28

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Recently released is the First Global Stocktake for the forthcoming CoP28

This summary of the progress made from the CoP23 Paris Agreement is the first official global stock take undertaken, known as the

Technical dialogue of the first global stocktake

The report will be a central debating feature of the CoP28 meeting, to be held between November 30th to December 12th, 2023, in Dubai, the UAE. This report aims to inform and gain consensus on how to move forward.

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Seeing a different Energy Future away from Fossil Fuel

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For me, the Energy Transition is a complex, multi-headed beast that always provides more challenge rather than less.

We seem to be faced with Hydra. The Hydra was Hercules’s second labour. He attempted to cut off the heads of the beast, but every time one was cut off, two more would grow back in its place. Another challenge in killing the Hydra was that its’ breath was poisonous to all who crossed its path.

The weakness of the Hydra was that only one of its heads was immortal. In the energy transition world, I worry that this one immortal head might be fossil fuel, challenging to slay.

I don’t slay beasts; I try to shape the behaviours of clients. Renewables feature front and centre. Getting engagement is hard work; adopting different thinking and application solutions is even more challenging. The level of engagement determines the ability to allow a different way to permeate and take hold. You need many tools, ideas, visuals, promoters, discussions, etc.

Finding the time for clients to get into these types of immersion is not easy; it has to be really “mixed” up. Do I have this “cocktail” right? Frankly, no, but tackling. Individuals or teams need to find their reactive points. They need to want to open up to change. I love the word “catalyst.” if it gains the type of reaction you are looking for, you are the agent that provokes or speeds action or change.

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Navigating an Energy Transition strategic pathway

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Energy Fitness Landscape primer

There are so many risks in the near to mid-term to derail the Energy Transition. I feel it is really hard to stay focused and not become distracted by the anti-energy transition groups. I am a firm believer in having a navigable strategic and tactical pathway to keep you on a given track along the route you have chosen to get to a given goal. Clearly, as we progress, we learn and adjustments are made but you have to map out a fairly solid (looking) pathway to keep on track.

I wrote about the concept of exploring energy fitness landscapes. The article “My initial thinking behind Energy Fitness Landscapes“, written in 2021, uses Hydrogen as an example, with a follow-up one year later. Here I am looking at the Energy Transition from an evolving technology innovation perspective. In other words, what “forces” can be identified or promoted that can transform the existing energy system through the pursuit of new inventions, innovations, or technological advancement? I took hydrogen as an example.

A risk of the energy transition is we give higher emphasis on the depth of knowledge in one area, get distracted often and fail to pull this together, to map it into the bigger picture of the practical, broader-based one. We do need a clear pathway.

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Thinking about the Energy Transition

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Thinking about the Energy Transition

One of the largest News Agencies recently asked me about the Energy Transition. These were some really tough open-ended questions: “What are the industry challenges and solutions,” “the key trends and developments“, What are the Challenges I face,” then “What critical solutions are there to the challenges” and finally “What value and guidance would you offer.”

The energy transition is a vast, complex area to view. I took a deep breath and thought about how I would break this down over a discussion of only 45 minutes. I decided to break it down into bite-size chunks such as Key Challenges, Worries, Big Ticket issues, My working issues, and finally, How the energy industry needs to get organized.

On reflection, I realized how many more points I could have raised or explained. Still, the structure of my breaking this down allows for some further thinking and additions that help me build this out, as many struggles with absorbing this energy transition, and I can build on my initial reactions here. Well, that is in my plans going forward.

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Our Power Grids require Reliability, Resilience and Risk management.

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The pressure on our Power Grids needs urgent attention

There is a growing, possibly intense focus and awareness that our Energy Grids worldwide are in serious trouble.

The significant changing consumption needs and generation patterns are causing significant concerns that existing ageing infrastructure is becoming a major source of risk to power grid safety, reliability and financial exposure and in failing to deliver power on the expected 24 x 7, we need.

If you look at ten of the top issues that are causing a growing crisis

  1. Ageing or outdated infrastructure
  2. Supply chain failures are delaying infrastructure equipment changes.
  3. A continued public opposition delaying infrastructure options and bureaucratic barriers
  4. There is a continued lack of sizable funding to make major changes
  5. System redundancies and stranded assets and the issues of legacy write-offs
  6. The increased complexity of the grid is still unclear in its final generation mix design
  7. Cyber Attacks are continuing and exposing significant weakness
  8. Extreme weather events are growing and exposing grid vulnerabilities.
  9. Previously poor project management, inconsistencies in capital spending
  10. Changing demand needs, the acceleration of electrification and the lack of new infrastructure

The need is to find effective responses and considerations of the options, managing change simultaneously while maintaining increasing power demand.

The energy system is being disrupted, and where there are levels of high disruption, there is always uncertainty, debate and learning to take risker views of the future, creating a lot of unease and hesitation. As quoted by one senior person, “we have an inadequate view of what – positively, and in detail – we’re building towards.

As the sector transforms at such an accelerating rate, the move towards ambitious decarbonization targets has required that clean energy is explored in all those options and required to be pushed to the forefront of future solutions. Integrating that variable green energy onto the grid and hardening infrastructure assets against extreme weather are proving some industry’s most pressing challenges.

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The power to unlock energy is through innovation

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The energy shifts we are undertaking within all the energy transitions today do allow real innovation opportunities when you survey the innovation landscape.

There is complexity in all the energy transitions going on. Still, the ones that can see the possibilities and ‘energize’ through new innovative solutions hold the future in our hands to capitalize upon as fast as we can.

All we can predict is that the pace of innovation and energy transition will speed and then scale up to meet the needs of a world rapidly wanting to decarbonize. The companies that are investors in innovation will be the best placed to capitalize on this.

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Wrapping up the Energy Crisis Year of 2022

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(ABC News: Michael Barnett)

This has undoubtedly been a year where the Energy Transition has felt, more often than not, thrown into reverse.

In Germany, coal mines have been reopened, and nuclear power stations scheduled to be decommissioned been given an extended lease of life. Nearly all EU countries, very dependent on Russian oil and gas, have been scrabbling like crazy to find alternative sources, all at rising prices and growing difficulties in finding supplies. The cost of energy to the consumer has risen significantly, and many Governments have been forced to offset winter bills with different incentives, payments or credits that will be highly expensive, so where does that cost come from, and what gets sacrificed?

France struggles with a rapidly ageing fleet of Nuclear power plants and the issue of how many of these can be up and running and functioning at levels to maintain power to their network and be able to support neighbours at times of their need.

The UK Government announced this week it’s the first opening of a new open coal mine in Cumbria a year after the UK lobbied to ‘consign coal to history. The developer, West Cumbria Mining, said it was “delighted” it could now deliver what it called “the world’s first net zero mine”. It plans to offset the emissions from the construction, mining and domestic transport phases. I hate the word “offset”. West Cumbria Mining says the coking coal it produces will be used for steelmaking in the UK and Europe. The local council had granted permission to dig for coking coal until 2049, with the mine expected to create about 500 jobs.. Yet the two prominent companies that still make steel using coal in the UK – British Steel and Tata – say they plan to move to lower carbon production methods. According to the UK Telegraph, this Cumbrian coal mine is economical and diplomatic idiocy.

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Not in this Text; disappointment at CoP 27

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CoP 27- “Not in the text” is most telling

The UK’s lead climate negotiator, the minister Alok Sharma, delivered a very telling speech at Cop27 revealing what some countries had tried to push through to an agreement.

Sharma was the president of the Glasgow Cop in 2021, and he was clearly frustrated with the events of the last two weeks in Egypt. and especially the final text outcome adopted at the Cop 27 meeting.

I personally was disappointed by the Cop26 held in Glasgow and chaired by Alok Sharma and the stunning last-minute intervention by India (along with China) where the phasing out changed to phasing down of coal.

Twelve months on and we seem to be making extremely slow or no progress on fossil fuels in any Global agreement of phasing down or out.

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Making the energy transition unstoppable requires innovation at its core

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Making the energy transition unstoppable needs massive commitments of political, public, private, and societal determination.

Innovation will be at the core of all the changes we will be making in the energy transition, be they for the current interim goals of 2030 or the ultimate one of2050, in achieving a transformation to a future where we are getting towards net-zero global Co2 emissions by this mid-century

Here lies part of the problem today to believe we might achieve these net-zero targets our planet so desperately needs to achieve. Much of the solutions required have either not been invented, scaled, or even commercialized, so are we naive or realistic in 2030? Continue reading →